The Indian mobile phone market, now led by Samsung and Micromax at No.2, could see a possible reshuffle in the top five vendor pecking order in the coming quarters, according to market research firm International Data Corporation (IDC).
“While Samsung has held on to its leadership position in the market, it is noteworthy that Micromax is growing faster. Samsung needs to continue to address the low-end of the market aggressively, and also needs a blockbuster product at the high-end to regain momentum,” Jaideep Mehta, Vice-President and General Manager, South Asia of IDC, said in a statement.
“Given the current growth rates, there is a real possibility of seeing vendor positions change in the remaining quarters this year,” he added.
Interestingly, data released earlier this month by another research and consulting firm CounterPoint Research showed Micromax overtook Samsung to become the No.1 mobile phone supplier in the second quarter of 2014. It said Micromax’s handset shipments share was 16.6 per cent in the second quarter, overtaking Samsung’s 14.4 per cent share.
According to IDC, among the top five vendors, Micromax and Lava were the only ones to have outstripped the market growth with 18 per cent and 54 per cent growth, respectively, in the overall phone business in the second quarter of 2014.
While Samsung had an overall market share of 17 per cent, Micromax had 14 per cent, toppling Nokia to clinch the second spot. Nokia had a share of 10 per cent, while Karbonn (9 per cent share) and Lava (with 8 per cent share) occupied the fourth and fifth positions.
In the smartphone market, for the second quarter, Samsung had a market share of 29 per cent, Micromax 18 per cent, Karbonn 8 per cent and Lava 6 per cent.
The data also said Motorola had maintained its success story in the smartphone market in India. Despite being available only through online channel, Motorola’s product, MotoG, has crossed one million-mark within five months of its launch.
The Indian smartphone market grew by 84 per cent year-on-year in the second quarter of 2014.
According to IDC Asia Pacific Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker (excluding Japan), vendors shipped a total of 18.42 million smartphones in the second-quarter of 2014 compared to 10.02 millions in the year-ago period.
Sub-$200 category
The sub-$200 category of the smartphone market is increasing in terms of shipment share as the contribution from this category stood at 81 per cent in the quarter under review.
“With the influx of Chinese vendors and Mozilla’s plans to enter the smartphone category at $50 level, the low-end segment of the smartphone market will become crucial in the coming quarters,” it added.
IDC expects the Indian smartphone market to more than double between now and 2018, driven by migration from feature phones to smartphones.
